expert judged only
Brian Lloyd Duckett

A street silhouette

In association with Formatt Hitech

Open Judging Results
Brief

See 'The brief in detail' tab for the full description!

The silhouette has always had a place in street photography and can help create an elegant and striking, yet subtle, image (look at the amazing work of great street photographers such as Alex Webb or Fan Ho for inspiration). The silhouette can make a very effective primary subject and can be considered a strong graphical element in its own right. Or it could be used, for example, to add a sense of scale or perhaps to imply human presence when it is otherwise absent.

Judge Brian Lloyd Duckett's first-choice winner will receive a Formatt Hitech Firecrest 85mm Holder Kit (£119.00 GBP).

The brief in detail

The silhouette has always had a place in street photography and can help create an elegant and striking, yet subtle, image (look at the amazing work of great street photographers such as Alex Webb or Fan Ho for inspiration). The silhouette can make a very effective primary subject and can be considered a strong graphical element in its own right. Or it could be used, for example, to add a sense of scale or perhaps to imply human presence when it is otherwise absent.

Set your camera to expose for the highlights or the backlighting; you’ll find that this will lead to 2-3 stops of under-exposure will enhance the silhouette whilst retaining a little detail in the highlights.

There are five essential ingredients in a street silhouette, all of which will be taken into account when judging the winner:

  1. Find the right background: ideally it will have strong backlighting and will be uncluttered.
  2. Choose your subject carefully: look for strong outlines and dominant forms (big hats, umbrellas, flowing coats, etc).
  3. Aim for good separation between subject and background.
  4. Expose for the highlights (in strong light, this often means under-exposing by anything between 1 to 3 stops – most easily done on the exposure compensation dial).
  5. In post-production, tweak your blacks to ensure your they are BLACK!

In keeping with street photography tradition, your image should be candidly shot (not set up in any way) and should be shot in a public place

Prize details

Judge Brian Lloyd Duckett's first-choice winner will receive a Formatt Hitech Firecrest 85mm Holder Kit (£119.00 GBP).

(img src="https://static.photocrowd.com/upl/FA/formatt-hitech.m-ikOQRS62jbHEg03Tjg.jpeg">

How it works

This contest is expert judged only with no rating by the crowd. You will be able to find out how you did when the judging or rating period has closed.

Entries closed
30 September 2020

Judging
30 September 2020 to 9 October 2020

Winners announced
9 October 2020

See open contests